


His Forever

by ambivalentangst



Series: Into His Fold [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: A Generally Bad Time, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Death Threats, Emotional Trauma, Gen, Guilt, Heavy Mention of Gamora, Heavy Mention of May Parker, Iron Dad, Murder, Physical and Emotional Manipulation, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony’s POV, Use of Infinity Stones and Gauntlet, peter’s pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-05
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-08-19 03:14:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16526267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambivalentangst/pseuds/ambivalentangst
Summary: On one side of the universe, Tony Stark sits in the remains of the ship he and the space woman crashed, wondering how it’s possible to lose a son twice. On the other, Thanos sculpts his child to his whim, and Peter can do nothing but bow his head and let himself be remade.





	His Forever

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so uhhh 
> 
> a) Sorry for that long ass wait. Tony’s part has been finished for ages, but Peter’s part took considerably longer. In my defense, I mess him up real bad.
> 
> b) This fic is getting progressively darker. There _will_ be a happy, or at the very least, hopeful ending, but getting there is going to be rough. Please mind the tags for each update.
> 
> c) If A4 doesn’t give me Tony & Nebula interaction, I will riot. Those two are perfect for each other, and writing them was easily the most fun part of this fic. I hope you all like them too, which brings me to the last part of this note.
> 
> d) Thank you all so much for your continued support!!! It truly means the world to me, and seeing how this series has just _exploded_ has made me excited beyond belief. You guys are the driving force behind why I do what you do, and I’m sorry for making you wait. If you want to come yell at me about this au, I have a Marvel-only blog now that can be found [here!](https://ambivalentmarvel.tumblr.com) I hope you like the fic!

Tony didn’t know how much time he spent laying in the grass, letting the words wash over his mind. 

“ _Yes, father._ ”

Wrong. Horribly, unnaturally wrong. The curl to Thanos’ lips in response, the hand cowing Peter with its simple weight on his shoulder. He didn’t need Peter’s freaky sixth sense to tell him that it wasn’t right. Every fiber of his being screamed out against it, and yet Tony hadn’t been able to do anything but watch a gaping, blue portal swallow the two of them whole.

It was a funny thing, how the space woman kept having to get him off his ass in all her brazen glory. Tony rather enjoyed her hatred, if he was being honest. It was refreshing to see someone as fed up with the world—universe—as he was, without all the cameras flashing in their face to force them to be presentable. Her hands were certainly unforgiving as they dug into the skin of Tony’s armpits, dragging him across the field where he’d lost his son for the second time. Despite the lack of dirt mingling with the ash in the air, his current whereabouts hurt more. The clouds gliding lazily across the azure sky were a slap to the face, a reminder that he’d been the home team and it hadn’t changed a damn thing.

He let her tote him for the few seconds it took him to process that oh, the space woman was hauling him back to her ship again. That was embarrassing, wasn’t it? Some version of Tony, the version that teased Peter for dropping something in the lab or when he found a particularly tacky news article about his alter-ego, might’ve thought so. The Tony with a hole in his stomach in the shape of his own blade didn’t really give a shit. Still, he figured if he was going to go back and face everyone, he had to start pretending like he was fine. 

He flicked the space woman’s arm with an awkward twist of his own. She gave him a look that made Tony briefly wonder if she wasn’t going to finish him off in Thanos’ stead, before dropping him. “Aren’t you just a doll?” he murmured, pulling himself to his feet with a wince and a hand pressed over his wound. He began limping back to his ship. “What’s your name? We’ve fought twice against—” Tony couldn’t say his name, the name of the monster that had terrorized his every moment—waking or no—for the better part of a decade. “We’ve fought together twice,” he amended. “At this point, I probably shouldn’t be referring to you exclusively with a range of epithets consisting solely of the words blue, space, and woman. Not necessarily in that order.”

She looked bewildered. Tony dealt with that like he always did, filling up the empty space with chatter to keep more confusion from moving in. “I’ll even give you mine in return, and I’ll go first. I’m Anthony Stark. My friends call me Tony, or at least they would—” The rest of the reference died a miserable death on his tongue as visions of curling up on the couch of the Parker apartment and eating microwave popcorn filled his mind. His expression darkened. He suddenly wasn’t in the mood for talking. “What’s your name?” he intoned gruffly.

The space woman—ah, there went the epithet again—considered him carefully before spitting the requested information out. “Nebula.”

Tony thought on it for half a second. A nebula brought to mind dust, a beginning. Tony eyed the blades at her side. Nebula seemed much more partial to ending things. In particular, lives. Tony liked the fact that the defiance apparent in the mere set of her shoulders began at her name. It didn’t suit her at all, and that was what made it perfect. He didn’t miss a beat, continuing his pain-ridden trek back to the ship. His suit certainly would take him no farther, and frankly, Tony didn’t want it to. The suit was stained with the memory of ash and pleading and loss that he couldn’t seem to escape, or even avenge, no matter how he tried. His voice was more tired than he would’ve liked when he responded. “Cool name.”

From the glances Tony stole at her from the corner of his eye, she seemed uncertain if he was mocking her or being genuinely appreciative. Tony didn’t think she reached a conclusion, but she didn’t attack him, so he counted that as a win. Regardless, she followed Tony back to the ship, where he got to work ripping things out of it that he could recognize, if only vaguely. She scowled. “Tearing apart the ship won’t help it get back in the air. We’ve harmed it enough in our landing.” 

Tony settled himself on the floor in an attempt to alleviate some of the stress on his wound, already fiddling with some wires. “It’s a good thing I’m not trying to make it fly, then. If I can get back to my shop and figure out how it works I can make it run better than it did originally. I’m just trying to find a way to reach some contacts I have.” The term friend, even old friend, didn’t quite fit, not right now. Maybe when he saw them all—whatever was left of them, anyway—he’d change his mind. At the moment, he was too tired, too worn to try and make amends. Nothing mattered but tearing Thanos limb from limb, as slowly and painfully as possible. He had his kid, and that was an offense Tony wouldn’t allow to go unpunished. It took approximately fifteen minutes of tinkering for Tony to get a crude distress signal going, and three hours more for someone to show up.

It was three hours too long, three hours for Tony to think about what Thanos could be doing with Peter and three hours for Nebula to watch his edges crumble with a kind of cold, distant pity. She’d come to him once during the time, seated herself in the closest chair while Tony let his head fall back against the wall and tried not to scream. “You realize that if you cannot attain the stones, it would be a mercy to find some way to kill your son, don’t you?”

Tony’s grip tightened around the communicator that was their only current plan for rescue. He didn’t have the energy to dispute the term for Peter. It wasn’t wrong, anyway. “Peter isn’t going anywhere. He’s strong. He can make it through any torture Thanos has for him.”

Nebula’s laugh was a harsh, coarse thing. “You don’t know, Stark. You haven’t seen the things he’d do to a child. If Gamora couldn’t make it, neither can he.”

Tony wasn’t cruel enough to degrade Nebula’s sister while her loss was so fresh. He looked up at the tinny ceiling of their accommodations and after considering if the request would get him killed, issued it anyway. “Tell me about her. Gamora.”

He could hear Nebula suck in a breath, but if she drew a blade he missed the sound. Tony’s words hung heavy in the air for a few moments. “She was an idiot,” she hissed. “A stupid, brave idiot that gave up the soul stone for me. I tried not to scream, tried to make it easier to watch him pull me apart, and I failed. That cost me her life. She was all I had, and now she’s gone too.”

Nebula did her best to hide it, but as someone who was an expert on sweeping vulnerability under the rug, Tony understood the rawness in her husky voice, the pain. “I’m sorry.”

A subtle shift of the woman in her seat. “It was not your fault.”

Tony blinked up at the ceiling and wished that whoever came would get there faster. He had to save Peter, had to start working or he’d go insane from the horrors awaiting his kid while his hands were idle. “It’s not,” he agreed, “but I’m going to honor her death anyway. I’ll honor everyone who Thanos has ever touched. Whether you join me—whether anybody does—he’s going to die for ever looking in Peter’s direction, and it’ll hurt.” Tony hadn’t expected the hatred he felt to appear so vehemently in his voice, the vitriol frothing and seething there. Tony wondered if he’d had the same feeling in him before he saw the way Peter trembled in Thanos’ grasp, before he heard strangled clips of the conversation he made as he begged for Tony’s life. He wondered if it should’ve bothered him for it to be there at all. At the moment, the only thing he thought about such anger was that it was good motivation.

Tony closed his eyes and waited for someone to answer his call. He spent what time he wasn’t sleeping thinking about how good it would feel to throttle the life out of Thanos one stone at a time.

Tony was nudged awake by Nebula, who growled that there were people outside. He groaned, pulling himself to his feet reluctantly. “Thanks for the heads up, Nebs. It shouldn’t be anyone you need to stab, but on the off chance that it is, have fun.” Tony kept walking and didn’t let himself turn around to see what her expression was upon hearing the nickname. An enemy of his enemy really was his friend at this point in the game.

Tony took a deep breath and refused to allow his hand to press over his wound. Tony had to be Iron Man, and Iron Man couldn’t be crippled in the face of battle.

Tony really wished the raccoon was enough to take him back. Standing next to Steve, Thor, and a woman Tony had never seen before, he couldn’t care less. 

Nebula nodded in acknowledgment. “Fox.”

Tony saw the creature’s eyes roam over the two of them and the pain in their depths. “The rest of them?”

Tony wasn’t at an angle that let him see Nebula’s face, but whatever was there must have been answer enough. The raccoon hung his head and his paws clenched into tight fists. His eyes slid over Thor, noted the axe at his side, and then came to rest on Steve. Tony was too tired, too sick with anticipation for help for himself that could, in turn, bring Peter home to bother with pleasantries. “Where are we? Where can I fix the ship and find out where that ugly, purple bastard is?”

Tony watched Steve’s eyes flash with concern and confusion. “Tony, we don’t have the resources for another fight right now. Just come back and reconvene in Wakanda with everyone else. We’ll figure out how to make our next move from there.”

Once, Tony might’ve thought of Siberia and the video he saw there that prompted the slam of a shield into his chest. Now, all he could think of was his gauntlet crashing into Peter’s cheek and the sickeningly kind caress of Thanos’ hands on his skin. He gritted his teeth and strode forward, ignoring the bristling of the woman and her spear standing a ways back. “Then I’ll make the resources, got that? I’ll go to whatever planet, whatever galaxy to bring my kid home.”

Tony’s hard eyes clashed with the clear blue of Steve’s, heart pounding and pulse racing, but it wasn’t him who spoke. The low accent, thick with grief, drew Tony’s attention to Thor. “Stark, we’ve all lost. There is no room for brash action. Thanos has the stones—if we stand the slightest chance—”

Tony spun with speed a man who had been stabbed shouldn’t have, lip curling in a snarl. “No, no slow recuperation and biding our time right now, point break. He took my kid.” He ignored the pain he felt at the action, his wound screaming its protest. 

Back to Steve, who held out his hands in a placating motion. “Tony, there’s nothing we can do. The whole world is grieving, we can’t just rush in without—”

“I’m not talking about him being dead. I’m saying Thanos _has_ my kid, brought him back after he died in my arms and has some twisted idea that he’s his son. I’m not talking about _resurrection_ , just rescue.”

Steve looked ill. Tony’s breaths came harsh, heavy. Tony wasn’t exactly looking for input from anybody, much less the raccoon, but everyone had to have a say, didn’t they? 

“Wait, Thanos decided that your kid was his? Like,” Tony watched the creature’s hands ball further before he could finish, “like what happened to Gamora?”

Tony really thought Nebula might kill the thing for mentioning her sister’s name, but she nodded. “Yes. He bargained for Stark’s life and when he was secure, Thanos stole him away.” Tony could feel his teammates’ eyes on him, as well as those of the stony-faced woman.

He blinked and saw visions of Peter’s terrified face flash before him. He took a deep breath and rested his gaze on Steve. “Get me back to somewhere I can help my kid, Rogers. He needs me. I don’t have time to waste.” 

His furious, frantic anger was out of place with the subdued grief painted in dried tears on the face of his friends, or at the very least, allies. Tony didn’t allow himself to think about what that could mean. 

“ _Now_.” 

There was another second of pause before the woman rammed the blunt end of her spear into the ground, and a short ways away, some sort of hovercraft apparated. Tony was halfway to the damned thing when, with a pained grunt, his legs gave out and he fell to the ground, the wound in his stomach smarting. Steve was at his side in an instant. Tony didn’t have the strength of body or mind to push him away.

“Tony, what—”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m fine. Got it patched up well enough.” Another pang, this time not physical, as he remembered the kid’s face lighting up as he figured out how to modify his web formula for medical use. Tony had slung his arm around Peter’s shoulders and taken him out for ice cream. His smile hadn’t left the whole time, and, oh god, that _hurt_. “Fuck,” he hissed softly. The admission was small, and yet, even so, Steve seemed to know not to say anything else. Tony let him put him in a seat, keeping a careful eye on Nebula to be sure she was doing okay all the while. The raccoon seemed to comfort her, at any rate.

Tony didn’t get it, but then again, he didn’t need to. Instead, he pictured Peter, the terror on his face, and closed his eyes. He would do anything, go through any _one_ to bring him home safe.

* * *

Peter had come to know the way a skull felt when crushed under his palms, all the different shades a face could turn as the life was throttled out of it. Most importantly, he’d learned how much ferocity was needed in a fight with Thanos to keep him from killing anyone else.

Thanos’ system was simple.

If Peter wasn’t living up to his standards when he sparred with the titan himself, there was an endless stream of opponents he could face off against instead. Countless men and women, varying in their ability to fight. All were expected to fall at Peter’s hands.

(Peter feared the day disappointing Thanos would bring him a child above almost all else.)

Peter was only permitted to rest when Thanos tired as well, and then there was the wink of a stone to put him to sleep. Not always the same one, either. They were each a different shade of terror to Peter. The gold of the gauntlet was their gild, and one by one Peter came to see them as nothing but a means of control, the powers that put him down sometimes in a bed, other times not, but always at Thanos’ side. 

The gauntlet, now that was something to hate.

It had taken him from the world, erased him like a stray mark on paper, only to fill him back in and keep him under lock and key. Peter pondered the point of it often as he came to memorize all the different smells blood could have when it wasn’t human. On more than one occasion, Thanos had caught his stare on the thing and laughed as he saw fantasies of its demise flit across Peter’s thoughts. “You and my last little one,” he had rumbled, cupping Peter’s cheek in his hand. “So slight, and yet so much potential within you. All your fury kept so dutifully under wraps. You’ve always been bright though, haven’t you, Peter?”

Peter had gritted his teeth, wishing there wasn’t a flash of yellow just _waiting_ to pounce the minute he disagreed. He dropped his head. When Thanos spoke, he expected answers. “Yes, father.”

That was nearly always a safe answer. Thanos loved pretending they were family, loved making Peter play at it too. Still, the warning in the words did not go unnoticed by Peter. He knew Thanos expected that his anger _stay_ controlled. 

The gauntlet glinted in his peripheral. 

Peter swore that if he ever got the chance, he’d destroy it. He didn’t know how, but he swore he’d find a way to crush it to nothing but stardust and scatter it so far across the universe nobody would ever remember it existed, let alone be able to recreate it. The longer Peter stewed on it, the less sure he was that he’d be able to control himself. He needed a topic change.

“Will you tell me about her?” Peter asked. The silence that followed after the question was nearly physical in its presence. To Peter, it was terrifying. He braced himself, locking his limbs out as he waited for some sort of reprimand. In the end, all Thanos did was sit, motioning for Peter to do the same.

Thanos shifted his weight, fixing Peter with the burden of his stare. “She was fierce. Vicious, and delightfully cruel. She killed ruthlessly despite her grace, led armies and conquered entire systems, completed mission after mission without fail. After raising her, I expected nothing less. Then, Peter, do you know what happened? Can you guess?”

The name of his predecessor ran through Peter’s head like a broken record. _Gamora_. He remembered the pain contorting the older Peter’s face, the rage on the blue woman’s. He supposed she was truly the woman to bring the universe to its knees, but he didn’t fear her. He knew what she’d gone through, and he knew the ending to the story already. As Thanos liked to say, Peter was smart.

“She left,” he whispered, suddenly wishing that he hadn’t asked. He wanted to give Thanos no example to lord over his head.

The confirmation was grave. “She left, and now she’s gone. I was forced to give her up.” 

Peter wished he could believe that. 

“I won’t allow you to make the same mistake,” Thanos murmured. “You can be everything she was. Be _better_ than she was. Gamora had no incentive, no reason to listen other than what might happen to _her_. Children cannot be allowed to make such choices for themselves, I know that now, and I know you’ll be greater than she could’ve ever been, Peter. You gave yourself that ability in caring for those around you, and it will make you strong.”

Peter shuddered at his side. “Someday they’ll be dead,” he whispered softly. It was a truth that Peter had always known, that everyone did. Parents weren’t supposed to outlive their children.  Peter took a deep breath, longing for the smell of motor oil or coconut shampoo, preferably both. 

Thanos merely smiled, eyes gleaming. Peter was always one faltering step too slow when it came to him. “Oh Peter,” he began. Peter could never be sure what was a threat when he got like this, what Thanos meant as a genuine comfort versus poison shot through his condolences. “You really think I’d just let them die? That I’d let you escape me like that?” He ruffled Peter’s hair. “No, no. Perhaps as a means of rerouting you. If you forgot all the gifts I’ve given you, they’d suffer. They might _wish_ they were dead. That would be your fault then, certainly, but we both know you’re better than that.”

Peter stilled, breath forming clouds in the air. It was never warm around Thanos (not that Peter knew where _around Thanos_ was at the moment) but it rarely showed. “ _No_. You wouldn’t,” he whispered, staring up at Thanos in disbelief. He tried to stand and take a step away, body drawn taut as a bowstring. 

Thanos caught his slim wrist to halt his retreat, all but crushing it in his grasp. “Calm yourself, Peter. I don’t want you hurting yourself, or anybody else.” Peter hardly had to read between the lines for that one. 

He paused, using every bit of self-restraint he possessed to allow Thanos to hold him. “You can’t,” Peter whispered, voice breaking. “Please, I’ll be good—I promise. Don’t do that to them, it’s only me you want.”

Thanos smiled wryly, looking at Peter patiently and waiting for him to come around. “You know I can’t take that risk, Peter. Besides,” he tugged him closer, and on reflex, Peter fought to break free from the following embrace, “ _you_ are something very precious to me.” Peter only spent a few seconds struggling. He knew he wasn’t supposed to do that, and let out a choked sob.

“There, there. Enough of your hysterics,” Thanos chastised him. His palms landed on Peter’s shoulders, placing him just far enough away to be able to inspect him. “What to do about that little tic of yours, I wonder?” he mused, thumb wiping at the damp tracks Peter’s tears made down his cheeks.

Peter’s head shot up faster than the crack of a whip, going to rub at the marks himself. “I’m sorry—I’m so—it won’t happen again I _swear_ —” Thanos had been talking to him about keeping his emotions in check, he couldn’t just _forget_ his teachings and not expect something to remedy that. Peter knew that by now.

“Hush.” The word silenced him along with a pulse of light from the stones. Peter wiped again at the tears that wouldn’t cease, no matter how he tried to reason with himself that they had to, _needed_ to, or he’d pay. “I think a few more challengers will suit this, don’t you? For every time you tear up, I’ll send out another. You will continue to dispose of them until your eyes have dried and you’ve compensated for your mistakes. Am I understood?”

Peter’s head dipped in a nod. His voice still shook when he spoke. “Yes, father.”

And so it went.

Peter never wanted to hurt anyone, but that didn’t stop all different colors of blood from coming to stain the floor of the training ground, a floor Peter doubted Thanos would have washed. He would find the reminder of the punishment poetic, or at least that was what Peter thought when he allowed himself to do so. It was hard to not just shut down and follow orders. If he numbed himself, he didn’t have to remember people pleading for their lives. He didn’t have to remember Thanos dictating how he had to kill or how long he had to take doing so, and that was a blessing.

With the new teaching method, Peter now had a running list of things he’d always hate, would never be able to stand for however long Thanos made him live.

(Because it really was all on Thanos, wasn’t it? He decided everything, and Peter would never, ever escape that. He would breathe and live and maybe never die if Thanos didn’t want him to under his thumb, and there was nothing Peter could do about it.)

The first, as always, were the stones. Some days he contemplated how painful it would be to touch one, to know an inkling of the power Thanos used to shape him into his son before it tore him apart. Then he decided he wouldn’t let those _things_ be what did him in. The idea passed quickly.

The second, a blade. His hands made him take responsibility, made him _feel_ what monstrosities he enacted. A weapon created distance, made him feel in a sick sort of way less like he had hurt someone, and that was wrong. More importantly, blades made, or at least exposed, blood—lots and lots of the stuff, splattering on everything in sight, including Peter. 

Peter wondered if spilling enough would drown him along with his victims.

(It already had.)

The third, tears. Peter was never going to cry again, never let another sob wrack his frame. His shaking, the shudders that enveloped him while his face remained stoic, he was still working on.

(There would be other, similar, lessons to follow. Peter, for example, did not stop his trembling fast enough on his own, nor the way his voice broke on certain words, _cruelties_ , Thanos made him face. Being taught to hide his fear was the only time in his life Peter had been slow on the uptake.)

The day Peter took his first planet, the stones were the only things keeping him together.

Thanos had made no secret of what he wanted from Peter, how he wanted a child that would remind the universe of its savior, no matter what it took. “The masses are incapable of realizing when they’re been granted salvation. I once thought I could rest, but now I see that’s not to be. There is always more work to be done, a message to be proven,” he’d explained to Peter, tucking a lock of hair behind his ear. 

Peter had shaken the ability to betray his terror by then and merely stared up, empty-eyed, at Thanos in return. 

His lips creased in a smile. “Look how you’ve grown. I’m proud of you, my son.”

Peter didn’t share his affection, but he didn’t pull away. The bearing of Thanos’ touch had not been instilled in him via the same methods as his other rules. Rather, learning to endure it cultivated a special kind of hatred in Peter for the twinkle of red in the gauntlet.

How Thanos had the imagination to conjure horror after horror—almost always involving Tony and May, sometimes together and other times apart—for Peter’s horrified eyes, he would never understand. Regardless, Thanos’ arms around him were the only kind of comfort Peter found he could get now, and he took what he could.

“Thank you, father.” Peter’s voice was steady despite its high pitch. Thanos had told him that he liked Peter being younger than his other children had been for several years before meeting their demises. He liked watching Peter grow under his tutelage, erasing all the vulnerabilities the world had left before he came to him.

“There’s a good boy. Smile, Peter. The universe will soon know our prowess. All your training has come to this, and you’ve yet to ultimately fall short of my hopes for you. I’m sure this will be no exception.”

Peter did as asked, flashing the same sheepish grin that Tony saw when he praised Peter’s work in the lab, or May coaxed out of him when his report card came in. It was out of place here, but Thanos was pleased. That kept Peter safe. “I won’t let you down,” Peter promised.

He hadn’t.

The palace was smoldering when Thanos strode up to its throne, gauntlet glowing to pin the king in his seat. Peter was half a step behind him, clad in a black piece that, although armored, made his slender shape only marginally bulkier than usual, and did nothing to make him seem outwardly any stronger than before. It would’ve looked strange to anyone who had known him then, regardless.

Peter liked color, his own blue and the red that Tony and he shared—gold too, in the end—but that didn’t make him say anything about the outfit change. It was so insignificant, meant so little when he had brought an entire world to heel at the whim of the man who had stolen him from his home and made him massacre in his name.

“This could’ve been so much easier than you made it,” Thanos condescended to the man, who was trembling in place. He was using the voice he always did with things like this, when he knew he had won and was playing at salvaging what was left of the loser.

“ _Monster_ ,” the king hissed, eyes fixed on the stones before darting to Peter and then back to Thanos.

“Savior,” Thanos corrected gently. “Now, all I ask is for a bit of loyalty. Your people will have the means to live as they deserve if you comply—you will want for nothing more. Just work with me, and your entire civilization can be raised higher than ever before.”

The king shook his head frantically. “ _Lies_. You slaughter the population wherever you go; I am not so foolish to believe that you’ll ever let us live in peace. You and your minions demand soldiers for your army, soldiers that never return. You will take our resources for a higher cause and never provide compensation. Is that what we _deserve_?” A hard look at Peter, whose face was flecked with blood. He had rounded up civilians and warriors alike, instructed them to stay, await Thanos’ mercy. There had been a few stragglers, a few rebels, a few kingsmen that pushed past the pain of bones Peter had broken to keep fighting.

Peter could not cry anymore, he had to remind himself of that when his actions brought on the screams and sobs of other children.

“It is part of a bigger plan, a plan you know nothing of. I ask one last time, surrender. Your compliance changes nothing about the fate of your planet, only how much you have to suffer for it.”

The king’s face twisted up in disgust, spitting the word out: “ _Never_.”

Thanos sighed as if he hadn’t spent every second since their landing hoping for the situation at present. “I didn’t want it to come to this, but you force my hand. Peter, persuade him to our cause, will you? Start with his fingers. I want to take this slowly.”

Peter’s demeanor was as unassuming as ever, save for the blankness of his stare. The only things truly betraying his capabilities were the remnants of his last kill on his cheek. He didn’t hesitate, his obedience smooth and unwavering. “If that’s what you want, father.”

The king’s eyes widened, petrified. Later, there would come praise for Peter’s work, an extended sleep, and a feast as his reward. Later, Thanos would tell him how Gamora would have done it and reminded him of why her legacy would never match Peter’s now that he had— _they_ had, he would say—all the powers of the universe at their beck and call. For now, a threat was being crafted, bearing news about Thanos’ latest child in the privacy of a throne room.

Peter had both suits Tony had made taken from him on the first day with Thanos. Walking away with freshly acquired control of an entire world, the stones and the reminder of what they could do to everything Peter held dear were the only things that stopped his screaming. The lack of a consequence would have meant his end right then and there because the screams would never have stopped, would have just flayed him alive as he was crippled in their hideousness. Walking away, the monochrome of his new uniform fit Peter and the guilt eating him alive a little better than what he wore before. 

On Earth, Tony had spent approximately a month working nearly non-stop to save his kid. For Peter, it had been three.


End file.
